Realize

Colbie Caillat recently put out a great song that speaks a lot to what I recently wrote about, though in a much more beautiful and artistic way.

The whole song speaks greatly to two very important themes: How one person can only so much, and how easily you can miss out on something great.

The whole song is saying basically that if the man she is in love with realized the same thing about her, they could have the perfect life together, but if they don’t realize it together it can never happen.
She says “Didn’t I tell you? But I can’t spell it out for you.” Then later, “No it's never the same if you don't feel it too. If you would meet me half way, it could be the same for you.”

One person can do all that they can, but in the end, the other person has to be willing to take that leap too. The video does a great job of showing how even when two people are on the same page, if they don’t share that with each other, they can miss out on each other.

So many things in our lives come and go, but the people are the one thing that can make the most difference, and should be held onto whenever possible. Losing people, seeing them as disposable, or just plain not taking chances with them truly makes it so life has a hard time giving us that ultimate happiness.

I hope that when you are given the chance, that you make sure you “Realize.”

Realize
V1: Take time to realize,
That your warmth is
Crashing down on in.
Take time to realize,
That I am on your side
Didn't I, Didn't I tell you.

But I can't spell it out for you,
No it's never gonna be that simple
No I can’t spell it out for you

C: If you just realize what I just realized,
Then we'd be perfect for each other
and will never find another
Just realized what I just realized
we'd never have to wonder if
we missed out on each other now.

V2: Take time to realize
Oh-oh I'm on your side
didn't I, didn't I tell you.
Take time to realize
This all can pass you by
Didn't I tell you

But I can't spell it out for you,
no it's never gonna be that simple
no I can't spell it out for you.

C: If you just realized what I just realized
then we'd be perfect for each other
then we'd never find another
Just realized what I just realized
we'd never have to wonder if
we missed out on each other now.

V3: It's not always the same
no it's never the same
if you don't feel it too.
If you meet me half way
If you would meet me half way.
It could be the same for you.

C: If you just realize what I just realized
then we'd be perfect for each other
then we'd never find another
Just realize what I just realized
we'd never have to wonder
Just realize what I just realized

If you just realize what I just realized

OoOoOOo

missed out on each other now
missed out on each other now

Realize, realize
realize, realize

Too many fish in the sea

“There are other fish in the sea.”

According to Random house, this proverb- or something so similar it is practically the same thing- has been around since about 1573. That’s a long history for a phrase that sums up the mindset creating the disastrous state of current relationships.

I have thought about writing about this for a little while, but a couple friends and their “issues” made it even more relevant for me. Saying that there are more people out there is indeed a positive way to help someone get over someone they lost. To help them realize that the death of one relationship does not mean the death of them all. In today’s world, that is doubly true. Between the internet and the ease of travel and moving, we can meet several thousand people in our lifetime. It is a great big world, and we can touch any part of it.

Long ago, when people rarely left their town, let alone moved cross-country, the idea that there were more people was true, but didn’t mean the same thing. The thought of knowing a hundred people used to seem daunting, even a couple decades ago, where now, the average friend list on Facebook is well over this mark. Factor in that we change careers and hobbies more quickly and more often than ever before, and the number of people that we touch is well beyond what anyone previously could have imagined.

So what’s the dark side to all these added social connections? Let’s face it, the more you have of something, the easier it is not to value it. People are no different, and our relationships show it. Very rarely will you meet someone who has held onto a friend since high school in a very meaningful way, despite the fact that it’s so easy to keep in touch. The reason? People have become more disposable.

While friendships are a sure sign of what I am talking about, in romantic relationships, the situation is even worse. My friend “Billy” met my friend “James” a while back and they seemed to hit it off really well. It was clear to anyone near by, let alone someone who knew them well, that they definitely had some serious chemistry. Being the mutual friend, they both continued to chat about each other to me, and I was pretty happy that two people I knew and loved might be starting something new. Then “Billy” said to me, “You know, it’s just not a good time for me.”

Doing my best not to scream back at him “WHAT THE HELL DO YOU MEAN?” I simply was reminded how easy it is to let someone go. So the ball was dropped. Chances are, they will never pick it up again. Of course nothing is definite, but knowing them both very well, they definitely had the potential to be a great couple.

Another friend, “Dan” said to me today, “I don’t know what I am going to do in a year, so I am really hesitant to get into a relationship.” Keeping my exasperation in check, I asked if it was worth giving up the potential for something great, for a problem that might never exist. “Dan’s” mumbled responses weren’t very convincing, but did show that clearly, the underlying reason he could think this way is because there is simply no notion that this could be his best chance.

In both these examples, and countless others I can name, one or both of the people involved are willing to give up people because “it isn’t the right time” or “they are worried about the future” or “they just aren’t ready for a relationship.” Ridiculous. Now I am all about leaving someone if they aren’t good for you, or you don’t see the relationship being worth something. Baring either of these things, however, people need to learn that what we have is valuable.

Relationships are work, but they pay off. The person in your life right now certainly won’t be your last chance for happiness, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t the best chance. Watching the rate of divorce go up and up and up, the number of people that can be classified as serial monogamists also on the rise, all stem from the idea that what I have is disposable because there is “another fish in the sea.”

The truth of the matter is that each person that walks into your life has the potential to be the best thing for you, but it is always work. No is ever as ready OR as unprepared to be in a relationship as they think they are. No one ever has the perfect moment in their life where now you can fit someone in. Our lives are meant to be malleable. You can control what you do with your life, but not the people in them. Given that who we meet is beyond our control, but what we do with them is completely ours to seize onto, it doesn’t make sense that we would give up the only power that we have to winds of fate, hoping that something better comes along rather than looking at the person standing right there, and seeing what is the most that person can be. Maybe they aren’t your Mr. or Ms. Right. Maybe they are. Either way, I guarantee that putting the most effort you can into that person will give you the best relationship possible with them. It may be that you turn out not to be meant for each other, but end up the best of friends (thank you, Chris Hahn!). Or maybe you just end up growing and learning about yourself. Or maybe, just maybe, you realize that the person you could have so easily let go of, is actually the person that is perfect for you. There may indeed be other fish in the sea, but I assure you, not all fish are created equal.

Wordle's startling revelations

While I was going to write about something entirely different today, I couldn’t pass this up. Today a friend sent me a link of what he made while playing around with an online app called Wordle. You put in whatever words you want and it makes digital “art” out of them. Above was what created for me when I pasted the “About me” section from my Facebook.

If you have ever seen this section, it is written in paragraph form, so I assumed it wouldn’t work well for something like this, but I wanted to see what happened anyway. I am pretty astounded by the results. Not only does this seem to work well as an interesting representation of my thoughts, it also adds and entirely new dimension.

Look at some of the words it listed. “Hold” is a great example. I wrote that, “An opera can hold just as much joy for me as a comic book.” In that sentence, hold has no significance. It is there to help me get to the point that I like opera and comic books, and to show my diversity. In that sentence, hold is a means to an end. In this picture, it is an end unto itself, and suddenly many more meanings can stem from it. When I looked at it, I thought of my joy at holding on to someone else. Thinking about it more, you can think of how one hold’s their life in their own hands, how sometimes we hold on to another’s heart. Holding on to what we hold dear. All of these thoughts stemming from one simple word, allowing me to see myself in that word, no longer as a bridge in a sentence, but as meaning itself.

How amazing language is that a simple word can have so much meaning. How “debate” can go from a subject I coached to the fact that I like to debate nearly everyone in the world around me. “Close” can go from “Being close to someone I care about” to bringing up images of how many aspects of my life are close to what I am striving for. How close I have come to some goals, and times in my life that I was so close to losing what I hold dear.

I may have never thought to include these things when thinking about myself or my life, nor would I have included them in something like an “about me” section, but the fact remains that they a part of who I am, and apparently right there below the surface, if I only had looked.

I won’t belabor the point or go n examining every word here, but suffice to say that sometimes the power of language is truly amazing, and it is great in these moments where we can look at ourselves and see things we didn’t even realize were right on the surface.

The Death of Courtship

I came across an article today about “courting.” The main focus of the article was the evolution if you will, of this complicated phenomenon. As with most things with a long history, there has been a lot of change to courting over the years- especially recently. In fact, when looking at the changes, the article eludes to, and I believe that we have all but lost the art of and even desire to court someone.

Even under the best circumstances, we live in a culture where you go on a couple “dates” and from that either end up with nothing, or a relationship. If the timing isn’t right, or something goes wrong and the relationship falters, the only way you really have to pick it back up again is to simply jump into the relationship again.

What exactly happened to make this change? Why is it that I am so surprised when someone actually asks someone out on a real date? How did this become such an exception to the way we live? While in most ways, the women’s movement and the sexual revolution have done great things for our society, it may be that in other aspects, we have lost some valuable things.

Though I myself have certainly followed this, it does seem incredibly limiting. I can’t think of a person I wasn’t dating that it felt ok to get romantic style gifts for. You don’t get flowers for someone your interested in, you get them for someone your with. This leaves you with little more than a first impression with which to actually begin dating, and doesn’t actually show whether or not you are actually looking to put effort towards that or not.

If you were to meet someone, and instead of immediately asking you out, they pulled the old fashioned card and tried to woo you, you are if nothing else guaranteed that you are someone they consider worth working for. That is a huge thing that we so often lack.

Throwing in the fact that so many dates are merely preludes to get sex from someone, the lines become even more blurred. Does interest lie only physically, or in actual courting, which was of course designed as a step towards a lasting relationship? Mix this with our societal ineptitude at communicating with one another, and you end up with a lot of failed relationships, or potential relationships that this never get off the ground.

With struggling relationships, the lack of courting can also be a hindrance. Especially in the global community that we live in, where people can move across the country or the globe with very little effort, relationships can become strained by time, distance, or circumstance. People being at different phases of their life face the same problems. Were a person willing to try and move towards a possible future, without tying up their present, there are very few options in these circumstances.

Imagine for a second that someone you are really interested in moves away. You want to see where this can go, but dating is really out, and the distance may be too much for a relationship. You really only have the options of being friends. In our society, there isn’t much in the way of a middle ground. If we were still in the mindset of courting someone, you could totally feel ok to send them gifts, letters, etc. that express your interest without negative repercussions. The way we currently view things, you really only do this with someone you are with. The person on the receiving end would find it near impossible to view these tokens as flattering, but non-binding. Our society has come to the point where we can have sex without commitment, but the idea that you can express real interest in someone comes only with the pressure of being together.

As mentioned, struggling relationships could benefit from the same thing if there was say, two people with similar ultimate desires, but dissimilar needs at the moment. The one with willingness and desire to commit, could continue to woo the other person as they moved through their life. Showing their interest, and keeping their “hand in the game” while still allowing the other person to live their life unencumbered. You can’t do this while being “just friends” because you lose all the romanticism, and you can’t do this while trying to date, because the one who isn’t ready isn’t given the space they need to grow.

In some ways we seem to have so much relationship freedom, but in that we seem to have created rigid guidelines for ourselves and the way we react to one another that though unspoken, may be even more binding in some ways than the understood traditions of old.